This invention generally pertains to file storage, and more specifically to the coordinated use of exhaustible and non-exhaustible storage in a file storage system.
In recent years, many different online applications have been developed for use by a large number of distributed users. Illustratively, many online applications provide services ranging from gaming to social networking to thousands or millions of users over the Internet. Because such applications have large user bases, many require the storage and retrieval of significant amounts of data. For example, an online photo storage application may require the storage and retrieval of many terabytes or petabytes of images files.
One problem with current online applications is that as the amount of data stored by each application grows, the operating costs for the applications accordingly increases. For example, as online photo storage applications receive more image files from its users, the number of relatively expensive hard drives required by the applications dramatically increases. As a result, operating costs for such online photo storage applications can become quite substantial over time. While cheaper storage device alternatives (e.g., certain types of lower grade flash based storage devices) are currently available, such devices have not been adopted by online applications as the devices only afford a very limited number of lifetime data operations (e.g., read and/or write operations).